Meet two women with different journeys and destinations -one a farmhand-turned-millionaire in the US, the other a biker trying to change notions of safety on the road

It sounds like the quintessential American dream.

A person starts from scratch and goes on to build a business empire. Anila Jyothi Reddy, who spent part of her childhood at an orphanage, now runs a software solutions company based in Phoenix, Arizona.

Her dream at one point of time was to have 5-10 plastic bags labelled lentil, red chilli and turmeric in her kitchen, she recounted at a talk organised by FICCI Ladies Organisation during a visit to India. Her farmer father could not afford to raise her and her four siblings. There was no free food or accommodation for a forward caste family like theirs in a village in undivided Andhra Pradesh, said Reddy. So, their father packed off the nine-year-old, along with her older sister, to an orphanage in Warangal town.

“That was the toughest thing I had to go through, from class V-X. I didn't have slippers or a school bag until class X,“ she said in an in
terview with Education Times. “I used to walk to school 2km away,“ she recalled. “At the orphanage, I used to think I would give a good life to orphans. It was silly at the time but I was stubborn,“ said Reddy, who
went on to start a foundation for orphan rights.
Reddy's family married her off. She had her first daughter at the age of 17.More challenges emerged.“We had a one-acre plot where I worked. At other times, I used to go to work on others' farms.“ Once while working in the paddy field, she saw an aeroplane flying. “I remember thinking to myself that one day I will fly too. In 2000, I took a direct flight to the US.“

Rewind to 1988-89: she became an adult education teacher with a Rs 120 honorarium from the Nehru Yuva Kendra (NYK). Later, she became a national service volunteer with NYK. When she decided to move to a city in 1990, her husband told her
to return only with success.Later, she took a typing course and sewed petticoats for Re 1 apiece.

A new path opened with news that 20-year-olds who had completed class X could enrol in an open uni
versity.Consequently, she joined a school as
an art teacher and quit stitching. Her enterprising mind ticked during the hours-long train commute to school and back.She started selling sarees to women on board. Once, when her cousin visited them from the US, Reddy asked her if she could survive in that country. “She said, `If you are aggressive, you can.'“ In 1998, she decided to make her way to the US to give her two daughters a good life. She signed up for a computer course. Thus, began her quest which eventually saw her securing a US visa.